


please stand by: an endless spring

by variegated



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Covid Fic, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:00:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28463496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/variegated/pseuds/variegated
Summary: COVID fic. Viktor and Yuuri settle into life during a global pandemic.Yuuri's sweating from the top of the ladder with a stud finder, fancy silver hanging hooks, and a drill. How did I get into this, he thinks. Then he sees Viktor smile, lips bowing into a heart, clap his hands, and give a happy exclamation as the plants are settled in their new spot. Something twists in Yuuri's chest like it always does.
Relationships: Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov
Comments: 7
Kudos: 45





	please stand by: an endless spring

Viktor takes up houseplants. It starts with one spider plant he gets from Mila that she is trying to offload on anyone at the rink. It’s bedraggled and on its last legs. It now lives on the edge of their oversized bathtub, shooting out runners and babies.

Next it’s a twenty year old, absurdly gigantic Boston fern in the living room, delivered from the local nursery, that causes Viktor to buy a gigantic plastic watering can they store in the closet. At first Yuuri protests. _It’s dog safe_! assures Viktor. And Makkachin gives it no notice. And it is a thing of beauty on the fancy pedestal that Viktor buys.

Then it’s a mounted staghorn fern. After that, Yuuri loses track of all the names as the numbers of plants Viktor owns explodes exponentially during the pandemic. Sometimes Viktor will take him on a tour of the thirty of them, telling him all the Latin names of the plants and asking if he likes each individual plant. Points out the new leaves like a proud father.

It does make the apartment look less grim. Less ascetic, lonely, and empty. Yuuri is used to a neat environment, but a well loved one. Yuuri only understood houseplants in the decor they had added to Yu-Topia, and they only sought out low maintenance, hardy, infrequent waterers. They weren’t fussed over, so much as kept for years and years until they grew to absurd sizes. The cactus in their entrance had belonged to Yuuri’s grandfather and was kept in an antique pot. It flourished when neglected. The only exception was the orchid in the office that his mother had given his father as an anniversary gift.

Not at all like Viktor’s twenty reminders a day maintenance with his fiddly silver hanging pots which Yuuri helped him hang with a stud finder and a ladder. _How did I get into this_ , he thought, sweating from the top of the ladder with a stud finder, fancy silver hanging hooks, and a drill. Then he saw Viktor smile, lips bowing into a heart, clap his hands, and give a happy exclamation when the hanging plants were settled, and something twisted in his chest like it always did. _Oh, that’s why. I remember._

Viktor functions best when he has an obsession. Yuuri emphasizes, because he has never done things halfway either, but Viktor has always taken hobbies to manic obsessions. Yuuri doesn’t mind, since being Viktor’s obsession has been his greatest joy in life, and something he views as the biggest gift, achievement, and medal he could ever win. And Viktor has always been Yuuri’s obsession, so he gets it. He has had years before Viktor to compile and catalogue facts and get used to the idea that Viktor existed. Viktor has only known Yuuri a few scant years, but he meets Yuuri where he is, and where he is is a soulmate level obsession and deep love. Pragma: everlasting love.

Yuuri’s apartment in Detroit with Phichit had been the cheapest they could find with in unit laundry and dishwasher. The laundry was non-negotiable since practice clothes were abominable if even left a few days. It was small and had low ceilings and ancient, tilted wooden floors. Phichit thought that it had been cut short so that the apartment below it could have vaulted ceilings. It had felt like a home. In the cold months the radiator and pipes gave a constant _clank, clank, clank, hiss_.

Viktor’s apartment was the opposite, but getting better. Pin drop neat, and cleaned weekly while he was out at practice by a maid named Maria, who Viktor didn’t know by name until Yuuri. Viktor had always been at practice before when she came by, had arranged it that way, and was an excellent customer: cleaning supplies always organized and ordered at regular intervals, checks made out to the agency, holiday gifts in cash always left on the kitchen counter.

They met Maria one day since Yuuri and Viktor rested for a bit at the start of the pandemic. She is a red checked older woman who works with practiced over-efficiency and humbleness. She moves like she doesn't want to be seen. She adores Yuuri, and he talks with her in broken Russian and asks about her family every week.

Viktor is used to excess, but Yuuri has never had a maid before in his life. He initially struggles to let things pile up. "Leave it, darling, I hire Maria for a reason," Viktor says while Yuuri is wiping down the marble bathroom counter to remove toothpaste drops. Viktor convinces him it’s ok. “Yuuri, I am a rich man. That wealth has to go somewhere. Hiring a maid is a great quality of life expenditure. Besides, it gives me more time with you, and I’m terrible at cleaning. You should have seen my apartment back in Juniors with Georgi. Yakov would come in monthly and yell at us, but we had no shame and didn’t even own a cleaning rag.”

“Upwardly mobile class guilt,” says Phichit knowledgeably on the phone. “You’re a big, rich, married man now, Yuuri! Enjoy it.”

“Trophy husband,” says Yuuri absently. 

“Isn’t that definitely Viktor? Russian trophy husband.”

“You might be right about that one,” says Yuuri from the couch, watching Viktor do yoga in the soft morning light. He’s too beautiful to be anything but a prize. The years have settled Yuuri into the idea that he might get to keep Viktor. 

_This one_ , Yuuri things in the dead of night when they pant together. _I get to keep him. He’s_ **_mine_ ** _, and no one else’s._ It feels religious, tantric sometimes, when they fuck. He’s on top of Viktor, and the moment slows down, when he looks into Viktor’s eyes and brushes his silver hair off his sweaty forehead.

_Yuuri, the things you do to me, angel,_ Viktor groans. They come one after the other, a few minutes apart. They know each others bodies like well-worn territory, drag orgasms out of each other without remorse or compunction. Yuuri is long past embarrassment, but there are times when Viktor still makes him blush, and vice versa. 

* * *

The pandemic is not as bad in Saint Petersburg as it in Moscow, when it starts. Yuuri panics, calls his family and Phichit daily. It’s awful, awful, awful in the US, and there is so little protection for Phichit. Yuuri worries and worries and worries himself sick. 

They can’t skate, and they can’t travel. Those are two of their favorite things. They go on long walks with Makkachin across the city. In March, it is still chilly, and the snow is melting. They wipe salt and snow off Makkachin’s paws as she enters the apartment, then give her a treat so she doesn’t hate the ritual. Makkachin is an adored and cossetted animal, but she has never had her Dads in the apartment 24/7. She grows self-entitled. Viktor loves it and dotes on her more than ever.

Yuri is losing his tiny mind since he can’t see Otabek. They Facetime Yuri every day. When lockdowns lift, they do alternating weekly homecooked dinners. His tiny apartment with his grandfather looks cozy, and Yuuri gets sent daily pictures of Potya. Yuri is very, very careful with his precautions because of his grandpa.

Yuuri is finally vindicated in his constant mask wearing. The travel masks he has come in handy, but they get many more new masks for Viktor. The clean masks stay on top of their dresser, while masks in use are hung by the door, taken off when they enter.

Their feet heal in the long absence from skating. They have so much time in the day without it. Yuuri finds himself at a loss. He does ballet with Minako in the living room, screen mirroring to the TV with a webcam hooked up so she can criticize details. He does endless pop dance routines with Phichit virtually. He cooks complicated Russian and Japanese dishes in their industrial style kitchen with the impractical, open shelving Yuuri finds so confusing as the son of an inn owner. It’s for display, not functionality, he has to remind himself. If they didn’t have a maid, the dusting alone would be a nightmare. 

Time passes, slower than Yuuri would like. Sometimes he feels like one of Phichit’s hamsters, who has an incredible life because Phichit is a doting parent - but who lives in small real estate. Eventually lockdown is lifted in part. Viktor and he go back to practice with relief. 

The time off is good for Yuuri, outside the pressure cooker of constant competition. His artistry, embodiment of his next program, and his self confidence grows under Viktor’s praise and their endless time to cook, train, and be in love. His jump falls come less and less, and when they do come, they feel less heavy in his mind. 

**Author's Note:**

> just coping with COVID by imagining some of my favorite characters get thru it. It's not easy times lately, is it?


End file.
